AtkinsRéalis opens U.S. licensing track for CANDU reactor technology

AtkinsRéalis on June 24 filed a Notice of Intent with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to begin licensing CANDU reactor technology in the United States, opening a new regulatory track but stopping well short of a construction application. The filing matters because it puts CANDU into the NRC’s pre-application pipeline, where the agency can open a docket, assign a review team and schedule the first serious technical meeting.

Under NRC guidance, that letter of intent is a formal heads-up that a major licensing action is coming. It does not approve a plant, clear a design or commit the commission to a construction timeline. The first consequential milestone will be the next set of filings and reviews that turn the notice into an actual docketed application and push the design into active NRC scrutiny.

AtkinsRéalis framed the move around rising U.S. electricity demand from data centers, artificial intelligence, advanced manufacturing and wider electrification. That is the commercial logic behind the filing: the company is trying to position CANDU as a candidate for large-scale nuclear buildout in a market that is looking hard for firm, dispatchable low-carbon power.

The company is not pitching an untested concept. AtkinsRéalis says CANDU has 34 built units and nearly 1,000 reactor-years of operating experience, with long service histories in Canada and other markets. The Enhanced CANDU 6, the design most directly tied to the U.S. push, is a Generation III-plus, 700 MWe-class heavy-water moderated and cooled pressure tube reactor that uses natural uranium fuel. Its online refuelling is one of the design’s defining features, allowing the reactor to keep running without the shutdowns that light-water plants typically need for refuelling outages.

The technology also carries a niche industrial advantage. AtkinsRéalis says CANDU reactors co-produce cobalt-60, and Canada produces more than half of the world’s supply through CANDU units. Industry material linked to the supply chain says that cobalt-60 from CANDU reactors is used to sterilize about 40% of the world’s single-use medical devices, which gives the design a second revenue and supply-chain angle beyond electricity.

The broader regulatory backdrop is shifting too. The NRC says its Part 53 framework is meant to broaden licensing options and accelerate safe advanced reactor deployment, a sign that the agency expects a wider reactor pipeline. AtkinsRéalis has also said it is on track to finish CANDU MONARK design work by 2027 and could start a first new build as early as 2029, with completion in the mid-2030s.

For now, though, June 24 was the opening move, not the finish line. The real signal that CANDU is moving from pitch deck to U.S. project will be a docketed application, an NRC review team and the first substantive pre-application meeting that turns this notice into an actual licensing fight.